KC, it's more than ominous, from what I've been told. One of my favorite little wineries, Prejean, tells me they will likely produce no red wine this year.

On the home front, I see major damage in my fruit trees (half of the peach tree and half of one of the apple trees did not bud). Bush plants like roses and forsythia suffered; the latter never even flowered this spring.

On top of the bad winter, I have never seen so much water (snow and rain) here. For the first time in twenty years living here I have had to install a sump pump in the cellar. Of course, the rain (plus a cool spring) reeks havoc on whatever buds managed to survive the winter, and so this is looking to be a second consecutive bad growing season.

Yet, my wife and I, in between kitchen work, are planting new things. We never stop!